Page 62 of Knot Her Cowboys
I spun back to Cooper. “I’m sorry I never committed to it.”
He shrugged, staring into the campfire. “Wouldn’t have found you even if you did.”
That shrug didn’t fool me. His mind was running a mile a minute; I could see it in his eyes.
“I’ll do up the paperwork for the job tomorrow,” he told me. “Temporary contract, I assume?”
I didn’t like how much that assumption hurt, no matter how correct it was. “Thanks.”
“Why don’t we get you settled in the big house?” Cash suggested. “Come back out after if you want, but no sense trying to get yourself sorted when it’s dark and you’re already tired.”
“Sounds good.” I let Cash bustle me away.
He didn’t say anything until we were inside. “I’m sorry things are weird as fuck. It’ll get better.”
I sighed, pressing myself to his chest and looping my arms behind him. “I fucking hope so.”
I got my things unpacked into the guest room, filling only one drawer. I wasn’t entirely sure how to get the rest of my stuff since it was on its way to Germany right now.
“Are you a shop-in-store kind of gal, or have you embraced online ordering?”
“Bit of both. Depends if I’m already familiar with the brand and styles.”
Cash nodded. “Order whatever you need. We can go into town for the rest.”
I took my time arranging my few toiletries, and Cash caught on that I was stalling.
“We don’t have to go back out.”
“But Morgan is leaving tomorrow morning.”
“Bring her inside. If you need a break from Cooper, and lord knows that happens on occasion, take it.”
I stared at the flower crown on my head in the mirror, adoring the play of color between the coral of the Indian paintbrush and the blues and purples of the lupines. “No, it’s okay. I can be a big girl.”
“All right, but you just say the word and I’ll push him off his camp chair so you can run.”
“You’ve got it.” I smiled up at him, and he dipped down for a kiss that both lit me up from the inside and steadied my nerves.
“Cooper will come around,” he promised. “I can feel how sorry you are in the bond when you look at him, when you talk about having left us. I know it wasn’t easy for you.”
“You’re just forgiving me this fast?”
“Honey bun, I forgave you when you walked in the door.”
I kissed him again so I didn’t start crying, clinging to the absolute sweetheart I’d had the fortune of tying myself to. But tears slipped out anyway. “You’re so lucky I love you or I would beveryannoyed at how often I cry around you.”
He gathered me even closer, squeezing me until I wheezed, pressing out my anxieties like they were toothpaste squished out of the tube. His next kiss was soft, traveling from my lips, over my cheek and up to where he planted it in the middle of my forehead. “It’s the right kind of crying, and sometimes you need that. If I ever make you cry for the wrong reason, I give you full permission to let Grizzy trample me.”
“You’ve never done anything in your life to warrant trampling.”
“Let’s keep it that way. How about an hour more outside, then you plead a headache, and I take you for another ride on the Cash cannon?”
I dissolved into giggles against his chest. “You’re ridiculous. But also, yes. I’m very in favor of this plan.”
I made it through two hours, rather than one, before a legitimate headache started to burrow at the base of my skull. Morgan hugged me fiercely, promising to see me at breakfast before she and her pack headed out.
“Might have to take a rain check on that ride,” I whispered to Cash on our way back to the big house.
